


music mystery.

by razussy



Category: Dangan Ronpa - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Non-Despair (Dangan Ronpa), F/M, Oneshot, Shenanigans, comfort ship go brrr, pre dating i guess, saimatsu - Freeform, this kinda sucks lol
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-04
Updated: 2020-12-04
Packaged: 2021-03-09 22:02:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,739
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27873506
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/razussy/pseuds/razussy
Summary: shuichi hears something off in a classroom, and goes to check it out.
Relationships: Akamatsu Kaede/Saihara Shuichi
Comments: 1
Kudos: 20





	music mystery.

**Author's Note:**

> this was put off for almost two months and i decided to finish it fnmnf i am tired so that's prolly why it seems rushed lmao i didn't proof read so good luck

shuichi saihara, a student known for his more bleak colors and quiet nature. he is not the type to be going out of his way to socialize, and does not complain when his classmates don’t attempt to interact with him. he liked it this way, independent with only his uncle and the two mutuals in his grade - maki harukawa and himiko yumeno - in his life.  
at most, he’d talk to the two girls about what they learned in class or how their talents were treating them; even then, the trio always sat in comfortable silence when they needed to be around each other.

he didn’t think this would change, used to the daily routine, until he heard the keys to a piano in a nearby classroom. originally, shuichi was making his way to his usual lunch spot to eat, but something about those notes sounded… off. pianos don’t usually sound like that, and whoever was playing noticed this, as he heard the constant pauses from the melody to the repetitive smashing of one note.  
out of curiosity, he stepped over to the room to take a quick peek at what the issue was - noticing the one playing was a girl from his class, kaede akamatsu.

“is everything all right in here?” asked shuichi, as he stood near the doorframe stiffly. he’d regret this, he knew he would. the brighter student spared him a glance when he spoke, her expression surprised to see he came unprovoked.  
“oh, the ultimate detective! you must’ve heard it, too, then!” said kaede, her voice bright enough to remind him of the sun’s rays. right- the polite, sweet pianist that he’s never talked to but heard chat with other students. it’s true what they say, she is nice to be around, he can already feel himself relax under her stare.

in a late response, he gave a nod to confirm. “the piano doesn’t sound how it's supposed to. play the key you were stressing on moments before- uh, please.” he instructed, his tone softening as he walked closer to where she sat. kaede did what she was told, tapping the g-note thrice before returning her gaze to him.  
“see? it sounds as if it is out of tune, but just yesterday it was perfectly fine.” she crossed her arms and let out a sigh, not aware of shuichi’s thinking face. she was correct, the instrument is not out of tune, especially if it did not appear so the day prior. suddenly, she gasped in realization and grabbed onto his arm gently. “a case for the ultimate detective to show off his talent!”

“huh? you want my help? b-but i don’t know a thing about instruments!” exclaimed shuichi, more shocked at the physical contact than the case suggestion. “i’m not even a full detective, either.”  
“you heard how wrong the notes were, and you look as though you are trying to find a possible answer for the piano’s issue! please, shuichi-” she used both hands to fistpump the air- “i have to practice for my performance later tonight, and if i don’t, i’ll be screwed.”  
he doesn’t want that to happen. thinking about it, what does he have to lose? he doesn’t eat much of his lunch, anyways, nor does he converse much with maki or himiko. in addition, she needs this solved before school is over due to her performance later in the night.

with an almost confident stance, shuichi fixed the cap on his head and locked eyes with kaede. “i’ll do what i can to find out what the problem is. i promise.” he stated, no nervous inflection or stutter detected in his words. kaede gave him a wide grin and stood up, planning to give him a hug as thanks, but she was stopped by him speaking up again.  
“and- and you can be by my side as i do! like- like sherlock holmes and doctor watson?”  
“really?” she gasped then propped her fists on her hips, a face of determination falling on her expression. she seemed rather excited, despite her more than likely not doing much but inform him of facts he’ll need.

starting now, the investigation had begun, and shuichi took a seat on the bench in front of the piano and looked down at it. “tell me, kaede- while you were playing, did you feel anything odd?” he asked, as he ran light fingertips from one end of the key row to the end.  
“feel anything odd?” repeated kaede, as she crossed her arms and closed her eyes, humming in thought. “oh! while playing, some of the keys felt sticky. both to the touch, and when i pressed down on them.” after she explained this, the detective found the general area that fit the describing word. just like she said, it felt sticky on his skin and as he played the note, the key threatened to get stuck on itself.

as he observed closer, shuichi noticed there was a bit of a tint in color on the sticky section. the keys were not clean, that was for sure, and they certainly were not their usual white shade. collecting possible theories, he turned towards the pianist and began to tap his foot; to his disgust, the floor was also rather gross.  
“ah... something must’ve spilled over and created a mess. judging by the lack of skill in properly taking care of the incident, the list of suspects can be downsized. furthermore-” he clicked his tongue- “i do think this was an accident, but a dumb accident. you know, a student was fooling around and almost, unintentionally, ruined school property.”

“wow, shuichi… you’ve already drawn those conclusions after looking at the scene for less than five minutes?” said kaede, astonishment in her tone that made him blush the smallest bit. clearing his throat, he stood up and tapped his foot in different spots on the floor. as expected, there was a certain limit to how far the unknown liquid spread - what made him confused was the strange pattern created.  
“you feel how scattered the sticky feeling is?” asked shuichi, as he continued to walk around and find the spots that were or were not clean. she was quick to mimic his actions and tried to form an image in her head of how it would’ve looked the moment it splattered everywhere.

snapping her fingers, she pointed directly at him, which made him blink a couple times in shock. “the culprit must’ve knocked their drink over and went to catch it, but accidentally smacked the thing holding their drink! that would make a bigger mess, wouldn’t it? especially if the drink dripped out while it rolled off!” this assumption was smart, she must have experienced something like this in the past, or at least had a sibling go through a similar scenario.  
“it does make sense, but look-” shuichi sat down again and patted the edge of the piano where the lid would rest if it wasn’t propped up. “logically, you’d put a drink here if you were to play on the keys.”

“and?” she urged him to continue, wanting to see what he had to say about her guess.  
“and- and you would keep it away so you would prevent a mistake such as spilling it all over, correct? so how would that play out if the culprit sat here, reached for a cup, but managed to drop and slap the cup perfectly for it to map out where everything landed?” he gestured the movements on how that would look, and as he did it, it didn’t feel natural. kaede saw what he meant then nodded, a bit disappointed she had not entirely got it right. due to this, he waved his hands in reassurance. “don’t worry! you got it, there just needs a new detail to be considered in this case!”

looking up at him, kaede waited for him to talk about what he vaguely mentioned. of course, he stood up and stepped to the side of the piano; after he did, he elbows the empty space where the pretend cup was, then did the ‘smacking a cup’ motion.  
“uh... what does that mean?”  
“two students. two students were in here being hooligans, and there is a chance while the one played the piano, the other was acting more foolish and bam- the crime scene was created,” explained shuichi, a small ‘ooh’ followed in response from the pianist. “now, i do see there is a box of tissues over there on the desk. it is possible that is what they used to attempt and fix the problem.” he continued, his hand pointing at the tissues.

kaede followed his hand then, silently, walked over to the small trash can near the teacher’s desk. crouching down with a grimace on her face, she flicked things around to try and find any evidence that would help them. unfortunately, this bin consisted of ripped papers and broken pens. “huh, it seems they didn’t think to toss it in here.”  
“hmm,” started shuichi, as he ran a hand on his cheek and watched her examine the trash. if he were the one to cause this issue, he’d definitely throw away the items used to clean the mess, or at the very least keep it in his pocket or bag. nodding his head, he dropped his arms to his sides. “let’s go check the nearest bathrooms. i do guys, you do girls.” after this, the duo left the classroom and headed to the next destination.

-

waiting patiently near the bathroom doors, kaede had her back against the wall and hands held in front of her. she didn’t find anything worth noting or bringing out during her search - just the usual discarded trash was found, not important at all. even if it did make her feel unhelpful, she was happy to have this opportunity to get to know shuichi more.  
since the beginning of the term, she’s been meaning to try and talk to him; she was always intrigued by the detective, and as much as she doesn’t want to admit it, she’s even read mystery novels and watched detective shows so she had something to approach him with.

she jumped out of her thoughts when the door opened, turning around to see shuichi walk out with a determined grin. in his hands, there was an empty, plastic up that had purple stains, and a few used tissues that hardened due to soaking in the mess. like the cup, it was purple, which made kaede guess grape soda or juice had been brought into the room… how annoying.  
“i am definitely going to post a sign that says ‘no food or drink allowed’!” she said, her eyebrows furrowed to show she was being serious about the sign. it would probably prevent future problems to arise, though it was a funny thought to imagine her going out of her way to do this. maybe he could help with that…

the silence was broken when kaede gasped and snatched the garbage out of his hands, causing him to jump at the sudden energy radiating off of her. she was intensely staring at the pieces of evidence, as if the gears in her brain were turning to try and figure out if her realization was correct - or, at least, close to correct.  
“this might be quite the accusation, but doesn’t kokichi drink weird, grape flavored drinks?” she asked after a considerable amount of minutes, drawing her gaze to shuichi; the fire in her eyes were bright, as if she was ready to wrap up this case and get back to her practice. makes sense, she never asked for an interruption in her rehearsal time, and in order to get back to it she needs to get the two that were at fault.

shuichi slightly chuckled and took the items back from her. “yes, he does. let’s go find him and see if he’ll confess, or give us some sort of insight.” he stuffed the napkins into the cup and lifted his hand, gesturing into the direction of where the cafeteria was. kaede lifted her head and lead the way down the hall, she wanted to be the one to confront kokichi about the whole fiasco and hope he doesn’t try to lie through his mischievous smile. god, that smile always irked her - she’s never favored the boy, even if there was a reason for his ways, she doesn't like it one bit.  
but given the situation, she’d still defend him. perhaps not for long, yet she’d still put in the effort to do so. this would be pushed to the back of her head as the couple entered the cafeteria, and scanned the tables.

spotting the one and only kokichi, kaede took confident strides over to the table and put her hands down on it to draw his attention. “you!”  
“me!” said kokichi, as he leaned back in his chair, hands behind his neck. that dumb smile again. “why me?”  
“you’re a suspect in a case of ours, kokichi,” summarized shuichi, as he stood besides the pianist, who looked as though she was ready to maul the shorter boy like how predators do with prey. it was a bit spooky, but she is very passionate for piano, he could understand why she’d be all fired up about it. still, if a fight broke out (which he doubted), there wouldn’t be much he could do to top it.

“a suspect? little ole me?” he said with a frown then looked at rantaro, who was just trying to eat his lunch. “they suspect me, out of everyone here! isn’t that ridiculous?”  
“not really. they are probably here to talk about the piano we screwed up earlier this morning,” stated rantaro in a blunt tone. it was clear he did not want to play any games. this caused kokichi to whine, as he did initially want to stir more havoc, but this caused relief in both shuichi and kaede. to them, they thought it would’ve taken forever to find the ones who were responsible. thank god for rantaro and his ability to be useful for once; if it weren’t for him, they’d be stuck in a web of lies for the rest of their lunch period.

shuichi sat down in one of the chairs and set down the cup filled with used tissue. “so you two spilled a drink and tried to clean it, but it didn’t work since neither of you know how to actually clean?” he asked, rantaro nodding to confirm while kokichi rolled his eyes.  
“we would’ve got kirumi to help us, though she was busy doing some other tasks. didn’t want to wait and get found out, so we did it ourselves and, well, got found out, anyways.” he explained before taking a sip of his water.  
“god, rantaro, you’re no fun!” complained the purple haired one, as he leaned forward and crossed his arms on the tabletop.

still standing, kaede shook her head and straightened her posture with a small smile. “thank you for telling us, then. i’ll have a teacher look at it and get the keys to be… not sticky. thank you, too, shuichi for helping me find out who did it.” she rested a hand on his shoulder for a moment before saying her goodbyes, turning away from the table and exiting the lunchroom. watching her, shuichi bounced his leg and thought about who she’d go to, until he felt as if he was being glared at like a hawk does when it is eyeing its next meal. he sighed and turned his head, locking eyes with kokichi, the one he assumed was not very pleased with how this unraveled.

“now that i can’t have my fun with the piano ordeal, i’ll just have to bully you and kaede for being a kissy-kissy couple,” said kokichi, as he made noises that were supposed to mock how kissing sounds. it did make rantaro snicker, though shuichi’s only response was lowering the brim of his hat over his eyes - totally not trying to cover up his flushed cheeks. ridiculous to think that they’d be a couple, right? he helped her once, and definitely didn’t do it so he could personally gain something from it.  
for now, he’ll take the future remarks from the boy, and swear to god he does not start anything with an unaware kaede.


End file.
